Encyclopedia of Anti-Revisionism On-Line

In Struggle!

More than 30 organizations in Quebec denounce the Katevale police operation

First Published:In Struggle! No. 131, October 31, 1978Transcription, Editing and Markup: Malcolm and Paul SabaCopyright: This work is in the Public Domain under the Creative Commons Common Deed. You can freely copy, distribute and display this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit the Encyclopedia of Anti-Revisionism On-Line as your source, include the url to this work, and note any of the transcribers, editors & proofreaders above.

In the pages of its newspaper, IN STRUGGLE! called upon the public to condemn the Katevale incident of September 29 as an example of police repression.

On October 25, more than thirty student associations, community groups, trade unions and progressive people belonging to the coalition to prepare the Operation Freedom demonstration in Montreal declared their support for a common position. In a letter addressed to Trudeau and Levesque, as well as Marc-Andre Bedard, Quebec Minister of Justice, and Jean-Jacques Blais, Solicitor-General of Canada, they condemned “repression (that) has been erected into a system” in Canada and, in reference to the Katevale incident, upheld the “minimal democratic right for an individual or group to know why it was held hostage”.

Develop the fightback

Not unexpectedly, Trudeau and Levesque have remained deafeningly silent about the activities of their political police. But IN STRUGGLE! has been receiving letters and resolutions from various groups and coalitions. During a recent support rally in Quebec City, the president of the union of the workers on strike at CJRP (a radio station) publicly condemned the repression to which workers are subjected as well as the violation of the rights of expression and association in the Katevale incident.

Growing political repression against labour, community and student organizations and the communist movement makes it urgent that people active in these organizations respond by condemning the Katevale incident and all other cases of repression. They should have resolutions protesting the repression passed and send them to IN STRUGGLE! Copies should also be sent to the bourgeois newspapers. Work at preparing broad participation in the demonstrations, meetings and statements of the various coalitions across the country like Operation Freedom. The bourgeois State’s “democratic” mask is slipping. We must denounce the dictatorial power that lies behind it.